Episode 3 of 3

Chemical Etching Process

When: 1888
Where: Washington, D.C.
Part of: Emile Berliner starts work leading to the invention of the gramophone

Berliner patented a process for producing records using chemical etching on wax-coated surfaces.

U.S. Patent 382,790 covered the process of producing records of sound by recording on a thin wax coating over metal or glass, then chemically etching it. The patent was filed in March 1888 and issued in May 1888.

Sources

Emile Berliner Wikipedia, revision of 2026-09-10

Machine-drafted from the cited Wikipedia passages and checked by a reviewing model, not by a human editor. Every passage cites the revision it was written from; dates and places follow those passages.